164 VOYAGE FROM INDIA TO SI AM AND MALACCA. 



set, and heard them preaching between ten and eleven o'clock at 

 night. At other times I have found them reading, singing or 

 working in their rooms. I also watched them making some 

 ornaments for their idols or their prayer houses, or preparations 

 for the funeral ceremonies of a rich Talapoin, or even working 

 at their boats, and I saw that the young men worked while the 

 more experienced showed them how to do it. 



The present king has gained the kingdom by his bravery 

 and cleverness. On his father's side he belongs to a kind of 

 Siamese aristocracy, and on that of his mother to the Chinese. 

 At the time when the Burmans invaded this kingdom he was 

 governor over a small part of the country. 



The Burmans committed the fault of going home with their 

 booty after they had robbed and plundered the land, and only 

 leaving a few people under a governor's command in Siam, who 

 were not even able to prevent the Chinese living in the country 

 from breaking the idols and ruining the temples. The present 

 king saw this ; he waited for a favorable time, circumstance and 

 opportunity. He surprised the Burmans left in charge, and 

 Treated them with such severity as they had deserved by their 

 former cruel Lies to the country, and in a short time he conquered 

 the whole land, because all came to him on account of his success, 

 and after he had re-established order, he proclaimed himself as 

 their king. He is rather small in stature. 



His character is not one of the best, as he allows his anger 

 to over-master him completely and for small crimes he has people 

 beheaded, regardless of what rank they may be. His sons, most 

 of them grown up, his nearest relatives, even his generals and 

 ministers, he has had at some time or the other publicly punished 

 with rotan sticks, and as the Siamese seldom wear their jackets 

 one can see that all the grandees have had their backs torn with 

 the rotan whips. 



Moreover he is jealous, fears everybody and everything, and 

 is grasping, and with all that he believes that according to their 

 religious creed he will one day be a god. To be able to draw 

 breath so that one does not perceive any movement in the pit of 

 the stomach, is considered a sign of his commencing divinity. 

 Moreover there are some other sure signs thereof, consisting in 

 his being able to sit perfectly rigid for hours like the idol Rill, 

 with meditative features and fixed eyes, and lastly he believes 



